


don't you know (that we's a family)

by orphan_account



Series: tomorrow they'll see what we are [8]
Category: Newsies (1992), Newsies - All Media Types, Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken
Genre: (the Jacobs family/Sniper/OCs up the wazoo), Canon Disabled Character, First Meetings, Gen, Illnesses, Original Character(s), Pre-Canon, The Refuge, character cameos
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-02
Updated: 2017-09-21
Packaged: 2018-12-22 17:39:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 14,127
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11972334
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: People meet their best, closest friends, their life partners in any meaning of the term, in lots of different ways. Some go quite well, some less so, with all the range in between.Jack Kelly meets his by tripping over him while admiring the rain, and somehow it's exactly what they both needed.





	1. your friend

_Late February, 1893_

 

* * *

 

All he'd wanted to do was _get away._  

They'd dragged him in, kicking and screaming, and thrown him into the basement as soon as they got him through the door — a truant, the son of a criminal, a thief and a runaway — but they'd underestimated the tenacity of the boy now named Jack Kelly. The basement may have been dank and wet and crawling with vermin, but he'd been trapped in it before, and knew all the weaknesses he hadn't gotten to exploit in his first visit. Nobody had bothered with making the walls strong or shutting the windows, so he'd broken his nails and worn dirt and rot like a second skin in order to dig a hole around one of the small windows that opened onto the street. The moment it was big enough for a scrawny 10-year-old to crawl through, he'd kicked off his shoes (no use for _those_ , he could get a better grip with his bare feet anyways) and hauled himself through the opening to freedom.

Of course, they'd noticed he was gone almost immediately — they only brought food to the basement every two days, and it was just Jack's luck that he escaped less than an hour before mealtime. He'd taken a short break to breathe in the smell of clean air, savoring the feeling of rain on his face and cool water between his toes, and before he knew it the Refuge bell was clanging and the sound of boots pounding on the floor was audible even before the door flung open.

He ran.

It wasn't too hard to lose them — he may have been malnourished and exhausted and still aching from old bruises (and other, older wounds from the time before he was Jack Kelly), but he was a street rat through and through and could run with the best of them, darting through alleyways and behind trash bins, even climbing fire escapes and running across _rooftops_ faster than grown men could follow. By the time he touched down in a back alley somewhere off of 45th Street, splashing his bare and possibly blistered feet in one of the puddles there and pushing now-drenched hair out of his eyes, there wasn't an officer or enforcer to be seen. In fact, as he made his way out onto 45th Street proper, there was hardly _anyone_ outside at all.

To be fair, it was a bit past mid-day, and most working kids and adults were— well, at work. Newsies would be trying to find awnings and shelter where they could hawk their papes without the rain ruining the newsprint, factory workers would be dry and toiling inside their buildings, and high society folks would be indoors or in carriages. The few people that were outside were in a hurry, umbrellas or books held over their heads to protect from the rain as they made their way from point A to point B, and none of them payed attention to the grimy street rat as he stepped casually onto the street to join them.

Jack thought the rain was _beautiful_. It changed all the colors of the city, tinting everything with a cooler gray than usual and breathing life into the plants and flowers breaking through the industrialization at every opportunity. He could feel it washing the dirt and blood from his skin and clothes, and if he'd been a more carefree boy he would have allowed himself to laugh and dance in it, reveling in the feeling and the scent of the air.

As it was, he found himself so enraptured by the rainfall that he didn't notice the person laying on the ground until he'd tripped over them and planted himself face-first on the ground.

" _Hey!_ The hell are you layin' on the ground for, you stupid sonofa—" Jack's furious exclamation died in his throat as he turned around and got a good look at the person he'd tripped over. The boy on the ground was tiny, smaller than Jack in both stature and girth, with a mess of shaggy brown hair plastered to his forehead and freckles dusted across his flushed cheeks. A battered metal cup was grasped in one hand, a few meagre pennies spilling out onto the ground beside it. Even from where he sat, a full foot away, Jack could all but feel the heat radiating off of the boy's body — he was running a fever, probably a high one. 

Jack could leave him there. From the look of it, the cup and the pennies and the fact that the boy's feet were bare of both socks and shoes, the kid was just a beggar — probably would died sooner or later anyways, without any intervention from Jack or the rain. Maybe some rich hobnob would come by and take pity, nurse the kid back to health and raise him as their own — he had a cute face (a bit of an odd nose, but it worked out), he could probably pull it off. Taking a sick kid back with him would put him at risk, would put everyone at the Lodging House at risk, might make it easier for Snyder's bulls to catch him and lock him back up. It would probably be in everyone's best interests if Jack just _kept walking._

"You'se better not die on me, kid." It was almost _pathetically_ easy for Jack to hoist the kid (clearly unconscious, from the loll of his head and the limpness of his limbs) onto his back, hooking his arms under the small boy's knees and draping the kid's head over his shoulder. "Or the fellas'll have my head and my pennies, both. Speakin' of which—" He scooped up the kid's pennies and cup, dropping the coins into one of his pockets and grasping the cup's warped handle with two hooked fingers. "—I'd wager these'll pay your rent for a day or two, just in case."

He set off for the Lodging House at a jog, now acutely aware that the less time he kept this sick kid out in the rain, the better. It took him a good few minutes to orient himself once he got out of Hell's Kitchen, but not much longer after that to find his way back to the building that was slowly becoming _'home'_ in his mind. Judging by the time, he didn't expect any of the other newsboys to be inside — if they weren't still selling papes (which they probably were — rainy days always took longer to sell out), they'd probably be taking shelter inside a deli to chat or otherwise going off on their regular afternoon adventures. The Lodging House might be where most of them lived, but it was hardly the sort of place a kid would _want_ to spend most of his day.

Sure enough, Jack was greeted by an echoing silence when he pushed open the doors and stumbled inside. It took a couple tries to haul his burden up the stairs to the room he shared with Specs and Eggs, but eventually he arrived and immediately all but dropped the boy onto his bed (Jack was the one who brought him here, so he may as well sacrifice his own bed. He could probably sleep with Specs later, the older boy _seemed_ to like him well enough). They were both fairly soaked from the rain, however, so he darted down the hall to grab a one of the worn towels from the bathroom and tossed it onto the bed before fishing out the stash of stolen clothing he'd been keeping under his bed. He'd planned on giving it to kids in the Refuge (nobody gave them changes of clothes there, and some boys were in long enough that they'd outgrown what they came in wearing), but he didn't want to sit around in wet trousers and he was pretty sure it would be bad for the sick kid to stay in the clothes he had on.

If he were a different person, Jack might have felt even a little bit embarrassed about stripping down another fella, but he'd seen just about all there was _to_ see while he was in the Refuge, and he figured as long as they both ended up dry and clothed it didn't really matter either way. The kid he'd brought in was scrawny, with the look of having not eaten much (or _anything_ ) in a while, and Jack quietly resolved to break into his stash of stolen food (so Snyder _may_ have been right about him being a thief, but it was for the right reasons so he really didn't care) to make sure the kid got enough to eat while he was here. He had a slight hang-up trying to get dry trousers on, because the kid's right leg seemed stuck at an odd angle and twisted, and wouldn't quite move the way legs _normally_ do, but soon enough they were both in fresh clothes with the wet ones hanging off of the bed-frame to air-dry, and Jack could towel off his hair and face before doing the same for his new acquisition.

Once that was all done, he returned the towel to the bathroom and sat down at the foot of the bed, one eye keeping watch over the sleeping kid. He couldn't have been older than seven or eight, and even though he was dried off and out of the wet, the poor guy was shivering like a leaf in the wind. Jack tugged the threadbare blanket from his bed over the boy's shoulders and, after a moment of thinking, darted across the hall and grabbed Minty's blanket too— the guy was always sleeping in Bull's bed _anyways_ , he wouldn't need it. 

The two layers seemed to help with the shivering a bit, and Jack settled himself onto the bed beside the kid and leaned his back against the wall, taking a moment to finally breathe and let himself relax from the ordeal that was the Refuge. It had been his own mistake he got caught — he'd gone back to talk to some of the other boys there, Billy and Tux and Greenie, and the guards had caught him on the way down from the windows — but knowing that didn't make the experience any _easier_. At least this time, he'd only been in for five days — a blink, compared to the _months_ he'd endured when he went in for the first time.

" _Jacky?_ Man, where's you been? It's been five days, we's was ready to give that bed away—" Specs skidded to a stop in the middle of the room, all twelve years and gangly limbs and wide, extra-magnified eyes turning to stare at the strange bundle on Jack's bed. "—Who's this? You bringin' back strays now? We ain't no charity, you know."

He blinked a few times, startled by the revelation of how much time had passed while he was thinking (it was almost dark out, how had that happened), and shrugged. "Kid's running a fever, and he was alone an' beggin' on the _street_. I couldn'ta just _left_ him there, Specs."

"Right, but I'd betcha it didn't take you _five days_ to drag him back here, kid looks like he's made of twigs."

"Oh. Uh, Refuge."

Specs gaped for a few moments. "What, for only five days? You'se jokin', Jack Kelly—"

"I broke out! What, you think I wouldn'ta been able to?" Jack crossed his arms indignantly, huffing. "They stuck me in the basement, but that building's got a real shit basement, so I just dug a hole an' climbed out onto the street. Just took me a little while to do it, though, since I ain't had no tools but my hands." 

After another tense few seconds, Specs sighed and deflated, climbing over the unconscious boy to curl up next to Jack and tug the younger boy into an awkward hug. "I'se sorry, kid. Jesus, the _Refuge_ — most boys ain't in there more'n once, and you'se already made it out alive _twice_. It's real good to see you back." They remained like that for a few minutes, leaning against each other's bony shoulders and matching up their breathing as they listened to the rest of the boys trickle in through the front door and the Lodging House slowly fill up with noise and laughter.

A few sets of footsteps echoed up the stairs, and the door pushed open to reveal a vaguely familiar face. "Specs? They'se sayin' there'll be some food soon, an' I didn't wanna..."

"Sure, I'll be there in a sec. Jack, you remember Romeo, yeah?"

Right, that was where he recognized this kid. Newer to the trade than even Jack (and Jack was _pretty new_ ), Romeo had taken to selling papes whenever his deadbeat father disappeared from town. The old man always came back, sometimes with money from this or that job, sometimes with nothing but beer on his breath, and Romeo disappeared from the streets whenever he did — but while the guy was gone, the kid was out with the rest of the newsies like always. He was a decent kid, with a wide grin and a bad habit of flirting with any attractive person to cross his path, and he and Specs had hit it off like a matchstick and kindling when Robin introduced them. 

Now that he had a name to put to the face, Jack grinned and waved at Romeo from across the room, eliciting another ear-to-ear smile from the other boy. "Sure do. You'se gonna be staying with us tonight, Romeo?"

"Ain't no food at home, so I may as well — Specs offered me his bed, such a _fella_!" He winked, then broke into delighted laughter when Specs clambered over Jack and the unconscious kid to grab him in a loose hold and rub one fist against his head. "Ain't he such a _sweetheart_ , Jacky?"

Jack snorted at the appalled look on Specs' face. "What, you'se lettin' this womanizer inta your bed? Specs, I thought you'se got standards!"

"Oh, screw you, Jack! I'se just sharin' since no-one else wants to get near this damn octopus!"

As if to prove a point, Romeo slipped out Specs' hold to wrap his arms around the taller boy, curling his legs around one of Specs' until he was hanging off of his friend like one of those odd creatures in the zoos they'd hawked an article about last year. The older boy made a few half-hearted attempts to dislodge his new passenger before sighing and turning to leave the room, glancing back at Jack with a resigned half-smile. "Want me to grab you and your new buddy a bite?"

"Don't think he'll be up, but I ain't had food for a few days, so _please_."

Specs winced and nodded before walking awkwardly out of the room, Romeo still clinging to his side with a grin just this side of impressed. After a few minutes, Jack heard the tell-tale _thud_ of two boys tripping and falling, and winced sympathetically while crossing his fingers and hoping it had been at least before they got to the stairs — falling down those would be pretty unpleasant. He could hear them bickering at each other, though, so it sounded like they were pretty much alright. It would probably be a little while before they came back — eating might not take long, but they'd surely get pulled into conversation and banter, and who knows how long that would take — so he settled back against the wall and stifled a yawn. He hadn't slept last night, and only minimally the night before, so he was all but ready to curl up and drift off.

There was a groan beside him, and the blankets by his feet shifted just a bit as the unconscious boy seemed to stir and return shakily to consciousness, shifting as though uncomfortable and turning fever-hazed eyes towards Jack. He opened his mouth as though to ask something, brows furrowing in muzzy confusion, but all that came out was a series of weak coughs and a pained whimper.

Jack grimaced — if he was sick enough to be in pain, it must be pretty bad — and leaned over to wrap the blankets back around the boy's shoulders where they'd gotten dislodged as he moved. "Hey, _hey_ — shh, don't worry. Hey, don't worry, kid. You ain't out there now — I gotcha, I'se gonna take care of you, _yeah_?" As he spoke, he realized that— well, that was the _truth_. He was going to take care of this kid as best he could, until the kid either recovered or died, and that was _that_. "You'se safe here, don't you worry. _I'se got you_."

The boy stared up at Jack with wide eyes that still seemed unable to quite focus on his face, but apparently at least some of what he'd said got through, because after a few moments tears started welling up and rolling down the boy's cheeks and he reached out weakly with his arms like a baby asking to be picked up. As soon as his hands managed to make contact with Jack — well, with his shirt, at least — the boy pulled himself closer to tuck himself against Jack's side, coughing weakly through his tears.

For a few moments, Jack wasn't sure what to do — he wasn't exactly the most _comforting_ person, not with how he tended towards anger instead of kindness, so most of the really little kids preferred to go cry on Specs or Bull instead — but after a time, he wrapped one arm around the boy and tugged him the rest of the way against his side, using his free hand to pull the blankets over both of them because sick folks needed to be kept warm, even _he_ knew that. After a moment, he noticed that the boy's weird leg was still stuck at what looked like an uncomfortable angle, so he reached forward and tugged _that_ into a position that looked a bit less painful as well.

Jack wasn't too worried about catching sick — he'd been a street rat (or good as) for a long time, and never seemed to catch ill as often as other kids — so he didn't say anything about the boy coughing on him or the fever-sweat soaking into his shirt. Instead, he just tugged the lumpy pillow over to cushion his back, leaned his head against the wall, and closed his eyes. Just for a little bit, he'd open them back up when Specs came back with food, or if the boy started getting really bad, so he wasn't _really_ going to sleep.

Just... resting.


	2. your best friend

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Charlie wakes up in a strange place, sure he's alone and at the mercy of whoever took him from the streets. He might be proven wrong.

_Late February, 1893_

 

* * *

 

_Where was he?_

It still hurt a bit to breathe, but for the first time in what seemed like weeks (he'd somewhat lost track of time after Lucy— well, _after she died_ , he couldn't exactly sugar-coat _that_ ), it felt like the warmth cocooning him wasn't just from his inevitable fever. In fact, as Charlie forced his eyes open in spite of the dry sting that started up under his lids the moment light got in, he realized he wasn't even _outside_ anymore— he was in a room. Not a particularly fancy-looking room, or even an _average-looking_ room, but the bare walls were solid enough and the bare beams above his head were still covered by an intact roof. Everything seemed to be in shades of brown and gray, which made him feel oddly sad — what sort of life must whoever had taken him in be living, to have such a lonely-looking home?

It wasn't as though he was about to judge them, anyways — whoever's home this was, they'd saved him from what likely would have resulted in his inevitable death on the streets, and Charlie didn't have the energy to be anything but grateful for that. Even if he'd been well and had all his usual energy, he doubted he would feel any differently. His mother had always taught him to be kind, after all, alongside teaching him his letters and numbers and how to think for himself. Thinking of her hurt, but it was a dull ache like the one pounding behind his eyes, and Charlie resolutely reminded himself that there was no use wasting time on tears for folks who were already dead and gone and had been for what must have been a month now at least (if he was judging his time on the streets properly). Besides, whoever had found him probably wouldn't take to kindly to him making a proper sop of himself, since it would likely get in the way of however they'd want to be paid back. 

After all, Charlie was crippled, not _stupid_. People didn't take in sickly crips off the street out of the goodness of their own hearts— there would always be some sort of motive underneath. That was just how people _worked_. Poor folks would want him to work for his keep, rich folks would want to parade him around as an example of their charity (whether that extended to _within_ their home would depend, of course), and it just went to figure that this place would fall somewhere between the two.

His father had been as cautious as his mother was kind (he'd died first, and Charlie was starting to find it difficult to remember his face). He'd made sure to tell Charlie the sorts of people to be wary of, how to tell intent in the way their eyes would meet his or dance away, how to sort out those who might do him good from those who would do him harm from the set of their shoulders and the rhythm of their stride. It was harsh knowledge, he'd professed, but these were things Charlie had to know because one day mother and father wouldn't be there to take care of him anymore.

None of them had expected that day to come so _soon_. 

The tell-tale creak of a door hinge brought him back to his surroundings, and as he tugged himself upright (despite the overall soreness of his body protesting against it) to face the source of the noise he realized he was in a bed— an actual _bed_ , if a bit lumpy and thoroughly secondhand, not just a chair or a blanket on the floor. There was a blanket — _two_ , in fact, one quilted and the other a clumsy knit — but they had been tucked around his shoulders and now fell to his lap as he managed to push himself into a sitting position. The shift made his head spin, and it wasn't until the dizziness had subsided that he actually saw the boy in the doorway.

He couldn't have been more than Charlie's age, or perhaps a year older — he was short and wiry, with messy dark hair and skin a good number of shades darker than Charlie's own (though it would probably be a bit lighter without the layers of dirt and grime). He had a small bruise blooming on one cheek and what looked like paint stains liberally speckled across the other, and when he met Charlie's eyes his face broke into a wide, crooked grin. One of his teeth was missing, and another was either chipped or still growing in. The off-color red bandana tied around his neck clashed _horribly_ with his clearly second-hand blue shirt, but he seemed to exude a sort of energy that pulled all those different pieces together effortlessly.

Somehow, Charlie's first thought was that this boy was oddly _beautiful_.

Bounding across the room in a few quick steps, the odd boy clambered onto the bed beside Charlie and sat there for a moment, beaming at him. " _You'se awake_! How's you feelin', huh? Oh, hold up, lemme just—" He leaned in, nose almost knocking into Charlie's as he pressed their foreheads together for a moment. "—yer temp-er-ture's gone down, that's real good! You want somethin' to drink? You'se been sleepin' for a day or two, I bets you'se pretty thirsty. Just a mo'—!" 

Before Charlie could even process _half_ of the words thrown at him (not to mention the flush that had doubtlessly bloomed across most of his face at the whole _forehead-touch thing_ ), the boy was already dashing back out the door. His footsteps echoed down what sounded like a hallway, and then shifted to the tell-tale _tap-tap-tap_ of a flight of stairs, leaving Charlie to wonder just what sort of place he'd ended up in after all. It seemed to be a big building, if there was a hallway and stairs, but the boy's appearance and the relative bareness of the room didn't really speak of much money to be had. The blankets on his lap, when he glanced down to observe them, were both clearly well-used and on the older side; the quilted one was a patchwork of fabric scraps that had half-lost their colors to fading and stains, and the knit seemed to be a mixture of whatever yarns the creator could find at the time. In spite of that, they didn't look to have been scavenged or retrieved from garbage heaps— in fact, they rather put Charlie in mind of Lucy's old favorite scarf, a lovely knit thing that had been passed down from their father's own grandmother and was worn from years of love more than anything else.

The scarf had been stolen from around his neck while he slept on the street, not even a _day_ after he'd dragged himself from the now-empty house and taken to begging for any bit of sympathy that might be spared for a crippled orphan. He'd seen the man who did it, had woken up the moment he felt it brush his neck and had screamed down the street at him to _give it back_ , but it wasn't as though he could have given chase.

Tears once again threatened to prick at his eyes and he shook his head forcefully, repeating in his head that this was _no_ time to be sad. He was alive, after all, out of the rain and in a bed with two — not one, but _two_ — blankets wrapped around him to keep out the draft, and if the boy from before was any measure to judge this place by, whoever had taken him in didn't seem to mean him any harm. It could just be wishful thinking — there was always the possibility that the boy was just pretending to be friendly, or that whoever had found Charlie was just misleading him as well — but he wanted to try to be optimistic about the situation. 

Another creak of the door-hinge caught his attention, and he turned away from the window he'd found himself looking out of (it was still raining, but just a light drizzle) to lay eyes on the two people now entering the room. Neither of them were the boy from earlier — one was taller and looked a bit older (maybe around eleven or twelve), with dark brown skin and a pair of glasses too big for his face, while the other appeared to be closer to Charlie's age and was chattering rapidly at the first boy as they crossed the floor to the other bed situated across the room from Charlie's. They didn't seem to notice him at first, absorbed as they were in their conversation ( _debate_? it was a little difficult to tell), but presently the taller boy glanced up and met his eyes. He blinked in surprise before grinning.

"You'se awake! I _wondered_ why Jacky was runnin' around lookin' for a glass of water." _Jacky_? Was that the boy he'd seen earlier? Charlie tried to ask, but his throat seemed unwilling to participate, and all that came out was a sort of rough hum. The boy with glasses smiled sympathetically. "You'se been pretty sick, so it might not come back for a little while. Happens all the time — Romes, didn'tcha lose yours for a _month_?"

The younger boy rolled his eyes. "Wasn't my intent to! Pop was tryin' to make some new food, but it really didn't go down all too well. And then wit' being sick and all— good thing I wasn't sellin' at that time, huh?"

"You woulda scared off the customers."

" _And_?"

"More'n usual, I mean."

Footsteps down the hall heralded the first boy's return before he appeared in the open doorway, and he beamed once more at the sight of the newcomers before beelining for Charlie's bed and pushing a cup into his surprised hands. The water was cool and welcome, and soothed his sore throat ever so slightly as it went down. While Charlie drank it, small sip by small sip (the soreness was accompanied by an odd tightness, so he couldn't take large gulps even if he wanted to), the boy perched himself on the side of the bed and grinned crookedly at the other two boys. "Heya, Specs, Romeo. Look, he's awake! I _toldja_ he'd make it, kid's a fighter!"

"Yeah, we sees, Jack." The taller boy — probably Specs, considering his glasses — smiled indulgently, stretching as he did so. "His voice is out, just so you knows. Might come back soon, might take some time, so don't go tryin' to make him speak."

Jack — that _had_ to be the boy's name — made a face. "For reals? Well, how's we going to know what to _call_ him? I can't just keep sayin' _the kid_ , that could refer to practically _anyone_ in here!" An idea seemed to spark in his eyes, because he turned to Charlie with an expectant look. "Hey, can you write 'n read?" He could, so Charlie nodded and watched, wiping a few accidental drips of water from his chin, as Jack tugged a newspaper and a stubby pencil from one of his pockets and pushed them over to Charlie. "Here! You'se can write yer name on here, if you wants to! Or any other questions you'se got, too. Sellin's over today anyways, so we's can answer 'em long as you wants!" 

The third boy groaned. "Hey, speak for _yourself_ — I'se gotta get my beauty sleep!"

"Twenty _years_ of sleep ain't gonna make your face any prettier, Romeo— may as well give it up while you'se still _can_."

"That's _cold_ , Jack." The boy — Romeo — pressed one hand to his chest, affecting a sort of deep betrayal as Charlie slowly wrote out his name on the biggest section of blank space he could find on the paper, along with the first questions he could think of. "Real cold. I thought we was friends!" 

Jack snorted. "I ain't gonna mess with Specs' turf." 

"He _ain't_ my _turf_!"

"Yeah, sure, keep tellin' yerself that. What—?" He took the paper from Charlie's hands, peering down at the badly-scrawled letters and grinning. "I'll be! So your name's Charlie, huh?" Receiving a nod, he glanced over the rest of the questions thoughtfully. "Oh, yeah— sorry, we shoulda introduced ourselves earlier. I'm Jack, that over there with the glasses is Specs, and the brat—"

" _Hey_!"

"—sorry, _womanizer_ —"

"Better."

"—is Romeo. Beats me why womanizer is _better_ , but he's an odd fella anyways." Jack grinned and winked conspiratorially at Charlie before continuing. "An' as for 'where'— this here's the Manhattan Lodging House. Place for workin' kids to rent a bed and maybe food when we has it. Don't worry — I'se been coverin' yours, seein' as this here's my bed an' as long as we's just usin' it an' no others, we's only gotta rent for one person anyhow. Romeo and Specs've been doin' the same." That... made sense. If the rent was by bed space, and Jack had just been sharing his rather than getting a whole extra bed, then it was pretty reasonable to think he wouldn't have to pay extra. And if they were working kids, it was fair to not put money into an extra bed, especially since they were all small enough that sharing wasn't much of a trouble. "And— who brought you'se here? Is that this last one?"

Charlie nodded, because that had to be his biggest question, and it was only made bigger by the rest of the news. Who would rescue a crippled kid off the street and bring him to a kid's lodging house instead of a jail? Jack's grin seemed to tell the answer almost _before_ he spoke. "I did! Tripped over you'se on the street, actually— sorry, mighta left a bruise."

_Oh._

Well, that was— Charlie wanted to say it was a surprise, but the more he thought about it, the more it felt like that was really the only sensible conclusion to have come to. The guy had shared his bed with Charlie, after all, and seemed far too at ease for it to have been anything but his choice. Not to mention how delighted he'd seemed when he saw that Charlie was awake— and that begged another question, didn't it? He gestured for Jack to give the paper and pencil to him once more, jotting down his newest question before passing it back into waiting, dirt-and-paint-stained hands.

"How long? Lesse... Two days? Specs, when did I bring Charlie in?"

Specs sighed in what seemed to be fond exasperation. "Saturday. An' today's Tuesday, so it's been _three_ , not two."

"Right, I knew that." Grinning, Jack turned back to Charlie, leaving Specs to the mercy of what seemed to be Romeo's best impersonation of an exceptionally affectionate octopus. "So, I'se gotta question too— how come you'se was out on the street in the first place, huh? Ain't exactly the safest place, you'se lucky the _Spider_ didn't snatch you up for loiterin'."

Charlie had no idea who the Spider was, but he took the proffered paper and pencil and slowly wrote out a response, explaining what had happened to his family and then him, including every detail that seemed like it might be relevant to the story. Jack read over it silently, flipping the paper over when he got to the point where Charlie had run out of space and needed to start writing on the next page's margins. His smile got smaller and smaller, until it vanished altogether and was replaced by an impressive expression of scrunched-up displeasure. " _Man_ , that's real rough. An' — seriously, some asshole _stole_ your scarf? That's just plain _mean_. I'se real sorry 'bout your folks, Charlie. They, uh— they sounds like they was real nice."

They _were_. They _had_ been, and Charlie found himself overwhelmed once more by the knowledge that they were gone — gone _forever_ , never coming back. He'd never harmonize to old folk ballads with Lucy again, he'd never sit on the kitchen counter and help his mother cook while they went over his basic numbers and letters, he'd never lie in front of the fireplace and keep the fire stoked while his father told him stories from the day's news ever again. The tears that had obstinately returned to his eyes finally spilled over, and he only barely managed to stop himself from sobbing out loud as the rush of emotions he'd been trying to keep under wraps and under covers broke free. He pressed his hands to his eyes as though he might be able to physically stop himself from crying, but it seemed to be a fruitless effort. 

"Oh, _shit_ , hey—" The bedcovers shifted as Jack scooted closer until he was sitting right beside Charlie, rather than down by his feet, and warm arms wrapped almost tentatively around his shoulders. He leaned into the embrace (Charlie had always been a fairly affectionate kid, and he hadn't been held or even touched much since his mother fell ill, which in his mind was _Far Too Long_ ), hiding his face in Jack's shoulder as the other boy ran hesitant fingers through his hair. "— _hey_ , it's gonna be okay. I mean, ain't sayin' you gotta _not_ be sad — it's, uh, it's real _good_ to be sad, that way you'se able to be sad and then move on, yeah? An'— an' we's got you, now. We's gonna make sure you'll be okay. Me an' Specs an' all the boys, we's here. You ain't— uh, you ain't _alone_ now, _yeah_?"

Charlie really _shouldn't_ believe him — they'd just met, for all he knew Jack could be lying through his teeth — but there was something in the other boy's voice that assured Charlie he was nothing but sincere. Maybe he _was_ telling the truth.

Maybe Charlie _wasn't_ alone now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay, second chapter!
> 
> (So I'm using Charlie as Crutchie's given name bc I've seen it used a lot and I kind of like the sound of it. Another part of this fic, alongside Jack and Crutchie meeting and bonding, is Crutchie getting his newsie name. It will happen, I promise! Just not this chapter, since he doesn't even have the crutch yet, haha!)
> 
> I know what I want to happen in the fourth chapter, but number three has me a little stuck, so just bear with me as I do my best to figure it out! <3


	3. your brother

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Just like with all illnesses, sometimes things have to get a bit worse before they get better.

_Early March, 1893_

 

* * *

 

A few days after Charlie woke up, the rains reached their peak in the form of what _had_ to be the biggest storm many of the boys had seen. Complete with pounding thunder, peals of lightning, and intermittent rounds of hail, it was agreed that the younger boys would stay at the Lodging House until the weather became safer, and the older boys would cover their rent until that time — at least, those of them who had some money saved. Jack had insisted on going out as well, despite being one of the youngest Manhattan newsies, with the excuse that Specs (less eager to endure hailstones and rain) would be _more_ than capable of taking care of Charlie while Jack brought back rent for all three of them. Well, two of them, as Charlie was still sharing Jack's bed (and Romeo Specs's), but since he had to make sure they had food as well, he figured it sort of evened out in some way or another.

Selling during the storm was very hard. The boys were forced out of their usual spots so they could find places to hawk their papes without the rain destroying them, and most of their customers were hunkered down inside to wait out the weather. Some of the older boys, more confident and better at advertising their wares, took to going door-to-door with their papes instead of waiting for customers to come to them. It didn't always work, but sometimes the attempt was successful, and many a bedraggled, rain-drenched newsboy (or girl) was invited inside for a warm meal and a few minutes by the fire before continuing their work.

Jack, even with a few years under his belt, wasn't about to try going inside folks' houses to sell them papes. A few people _offered_ — it wasn't really particularly odd, he was young and rather scrawny for his age, and inspired a decent amount of pity — but after the _last_ family he'd been around, he just didn't feel all that comfortable with the idea. The rain was far preferable, in his opinion — he found it fascinating to see how it changed the look and feel of New York, how familiar locations become new once more in the strange light and texture of the storm.

The second day of the storm, a girl approached him as he made his way through the streets, today aiming for the tree cover of Central Park in the hopes that anyone forced to travel through the city might do the same. She wasn't much older than him — perhaps the same age as Specs, if he had to guess — and offered him a dime ( _far_ more than a single one of his papes was worth, even with a pretty good headline) while gesturing down the block to what was presumably her family. "My mom was wondering if we could offer you something to eat, or maybe a warmer coat — my brother David is about your age, you could take his? Only it's _really_ quite awful out here, and she's worried about all of you." 

Her face was faintly concerned, a pale heart shape tucked under a blue woolen hood, and when Jack glanced over at her family the boy — the one about his age, rather than the toddler tucked into his mother's arms — grinned shyly and waved back at him. He was sorely tempted — he was cold, and if the storm continued tomorrow he'd be out of dry clothes to wear and would have to go out in the same wet ones again (and that was, as he knew from experience, _extraordinarily_ unpleasant) — but he had Specs and Romeo and Charlie to think of, which meant he had to make the most of his time. "I'se _real_ sorry, miss, but I'se got folks countin' on me an' places to be. But, uh, if your mother wants to offer for someone _else_ , my pal Bells might 'ppreciate somethin'. She usually sells a few blocks down — red hair, no sleeves, an' her nose gets all red like a cherry in th' cold." Lightning flashed across the sky, with thunder rumbling not long after, and Jack darted away down the street with a hurried "Enjoy your pape, stay outta the rain, _sorry-gotta-go-bye!_ "

Once he slowed to a walk, under the shelter of the trees of Central Park, Jack felt a little bad for just running away. It really _had_ been nice of her to offer, especially since they hadn't exactly looked what he'd call wealthy, and her brother likely didn't have more than the single coat to his name. But he hadn't lied about having places to be either, and — and just like the day before, the thought of getting near a _family_ , an _actual_ one, just sat sour in the back of his throat. Better to stay far away from that sort of thing.

He hoped she realized that paying him a _dime_ for a single pape was probably worth more than the other offer, anyways. That dime was _four whole papes_ he didn't have to worry about selling, and if he _did?_ Then it would go to a proper dinner, and wouldn't that be _something!_

As he wandered under the somewhat meagre cover of the trees, waving and babbling with halfway-fabricated energy at any passers-by, Jack let his thoughts turn back to his friends at the Lodging House, and to his newest in particular. Well, maybe he couldn't call Charlie a friend yet — _Jack_ considered them friends, but it probably wasn't the same on the other end. Basically kidnapping someone off the streets wasn't _exactly_ a proper basis for friendship, after all.

Charlie's recovery had been going smoothly, much to everyone's relief. He'd had trouble keeping food down the first day or two, but that morning he'd had a full breakfast (well, as full as _any_ of them ever had), and his color had been returning steadily. The feverish flush on his cheeks had subsided, leaving just the slightest rosy tint in it's place that seemed to be a natural tone more than anything else, and his eyes were brighter and clearer every day. He still couldn't speak (which disappointed Jack a bit, as a part of him had rather hoped to hear his voice), but he was quick with a pen and expressive enough that communication hadn't proved to be much of an issue at all.

The biggest obstacle, as far as Jack could see, was the boy's legs. Charlie had told them, perhaps the day before, that he'd been crippled practically his entire life, and couldn't walk or even really _move around_ on his own at all. He could move one leg like normal, though it was pretty weak from not being used, but the other was oddly angled and, according to Charlie, completely unresponsive outside of aches and pains that ranged from mild to severe but were always around in one form or another. Since Charlie wouldn't be able to just _stay in bed_ the rest of his life — he'd already expressed interest in selling papes with the rest of the boys, and it wasn't as though Jack could carry him everywhere (though he wasn't entirely _opposed_ to the idea, especially since Charlie was _tiny_ ) — they needed to find a way for him to get about on his own. A cane or a walking stick wouldn't be enough, since his bum leg was a good bit more severe than a limp, and so far nobody had managed any better ideas.

Caught up in his thoughts, Jack found himself yanked abruptly back into the present when his foot caught on something and sent him tumbling face-first into the mud. "Oh, _for the love of—_ "

He turned to glare angrily at the object that had tripped him this time, a spectacularly large branch that looked to have been felled from one of the trees nearby a day or two ago. The thickest section of it was about as thick as Bull's belly — and he was pretty big for a newsboy, to be sure — and it was probably longer than Jack was tall. _Definitely_ was, in fact. What _was_ it with Jack tripping over things this month, huh? First Charlie, and now this _big dumb branch—_

"Woah, hey." Jack knelt down next to the branch, hunkering over his papes to shield them from the rain. He'd seen one or two fellas — not newsboys, richer folk who could afford doctors when they got hurt — using crutches to get around with a broken leg or foot. And if he could get this branch into shape, a bunch of whittling here and there to get the bark off and make it comfy to use— it might just be what they needed help Charlie move around. A grin stretched across his face and he whistled in delight, laughing at the way his missing teeth made the noise sound even odder than usual. "This'll be _perfect!_ Just gotta get it somewhere safe an' dry—"

The rest of the day passed quite quickly after that.

From thereon out, Jack's days fell into a new sort of pattern. Get up early, skip breakfast, sell his papes as quickly as he could, and then run to the park where his branch was stashed to work on the project until the sun began to go down. Meet up with the older boys at Jacobi's Deli, grab a bite and a drink, and head back to chat with Charlie until they went to bed. Rinse, and repeat. The weather cleared up after a few more days, leaving the streets of New York drenched and chilly but the air clean and open once again. Business got better for the newsies, and it seemed like the weather was finally starting to move into Spring properly.

Carving the crutch was a slow, arduous process, especially considering that the borrowed knife Jack was using wasn't even _remotely_ intended for this purpose (he'd return it to the guy he stole it from _eventually_ ). After the first few days, he lost count of how many times he'd accidentally cut himself, hands more used to holding papes and pencils than they were to handling a sharp object. Every evening when he got back, Charlie would smile and wave at him and insist on wrapping up the injuries with scraps of fabric, asking (by pencil and paper and eventually just by his eyes alone) what Jack was doing. Every evening, Jack would grin and press a single secretive finger to his lips and whisper, "It's a _surprise_ ," and count down the days until his project would be done.

The first step had been removing the bark, and as he did so Jack had slowly put together the pieces of the design he had in mind. A nice solid top piece, to rest under Charlie's arm and hold his weight, would be necessary. One of the off-shoot branches, he could whittle down to a hand-hold, for additional maneuverability. The rest, of course, had to be thinned down and smoothed so that his new friend (they _were_ friends, _weren't they_ ) wouldn't end up with any accidental splinters. It became almost enjoyable, scrambling his way up into the tree where he'd hidden his tools and materials and sitting with his back braced against the trunk until sunset, slowly growing more accustomed to the knife in his hands and the wood beneath his fingertips. Maybe he'd 'borrow' a bit of polish or varnish from a carpenter, give the crutch a nice outer coat to make it all shiny and pretty once it was done. Something to cushion the ends, too — fabric scraps might do the trick, wrapped around nice and thick to make a pillow-y effect.

Truth be told, Jack was pretty proud of the whole thing.

He'd heard from Specs that Charlie was determined to learn to move around the room on his own, slow careful steps while using another boy's arm or any of the many available bedposts to hold himself upright. About a week after the rain had let up, Jack even arrived back at their room in the Lodging House to find Charlie _waiting_ for him by the door — somewhat out of breath and leaning heavily on the doorframe, but upright and smiling like a dozen suns _and then some_. He hadn't been able to speak yet (thankfully, he was nearly recovered from his illness, but his voice seemed to have taken a hit and they weren't yet sure whether it would ever _really_ return), but there had just been something in his eyes that told Jack everything he meant to say — it had echoed there in the dimples of his cheeks and the brightness of his crooked smile, whispering ' _welcome home_ '. 

One evening, while they were laying in bed together and waiting for sleep to come, Jack turned his head to the side to look at Charlie and grinned. "Hey, once you'se really all better'n walkin', let's _dance_!"

At this point, Charlie didn't even need to use the pencil to convey the clear question in his eyes.

"Well, I bets you ain't done it before, yeah? An' it's _real fun_! You finds some fella what can play a tune, and _just—_ " He pushed himself upright in order to demonstrate with an exaggerated wiggle of his shoulders that nearly sent him tumbling over Charlie in a heap and earned a startled whisper of a laugh from his companion. "So once you'se all better, I'se gonna dance with you! Specs too, he's _real good—_ an' Robin! Robin oughta be on the _Bowery_ , they's the _real deal_!"

Across the room, Eggs grumbled something about _kids needing to sleep instead of talk_ , and Jack wriggled back under the shared blanket with a sheepish grin. The excited smile on Charlie's face as they curled up to sleep was more than worth it.

It took another two days after that, but finally Jack found himself watching the sun set, hands idle and a finished (if somewhat rudimentary-looking) crutch laying across his legs. Not a single finger had been spared, and his hands were peppered with small nicks and scrapes and patches of rough skin and blisters that he hadn't possessed before (on his _feet_ , perhaps, but selling papes actually didn't tend to be that hard on the hands). In spite of that, he found himself grinning without abandon, feet swinging in the open air and laughter bubbling up from the pit of his belly to escape into the evening like birdsong. _He'd done it—_ he'd made Charlie a crutch to walk with, his friend would be able to walk and sell papes with him and learn to dance, and wasn't that just _fantastic_?

The surface of the wood was still fairly plain-looking, and Jack could hardly give his friend a _plain-looking_ crutch — no, Charlie deserved a crutch that looked nice and shiny, just like his smile! Borrowing — oh, _let's be real_ , he was going to steal it (and then maybe give it back once he was done, he wasn't an _entirely_ immoral fella) — a small tin of wood polish sounded like a pretty good plan, that way he could give it a real nice look like Charlie deserved. Then he could find some scrap cloth — maybe one of the old seamstresses might be cajoled into giving him some, they were always soft for poor orphan boys with big smiles and ' _kind hearts_ ' (not that he had much of a kind heart, _per se_ , but he sure could _fake_ it for all he's worth) — and that would make for pretty padding, especially if they'd give him some with _colors_ and _patterns_. Blue would suit Charlie best, he thought, or maybe a soft green.

Oh, wouldn't Charlie be surprised when he saw it! ( _Would he like it?_ Jack hoped he would, he sured _hoped_ Charlie would like it, else it would have been a pretty big waste of his time, not to mention the sheer disappointment). 

Maybe it was the giddiness of excitement that made him a little careless, maybe he was distracted by thoughts of how ( _he hoped_ ) Charlie's face would light up when Jack returned to the Lodging House with his gift in tow. Regardless of the reason, he slipped into the carpenter's shop a little too hastily, slipped the tin of polish into his pocket without his usual finesse (and as a street rat used to sticky-fingering things he needed, Jack liked to think he had _quite a bit of finesse to do with_ ), and before he knew it, there was a very angry shopkeep yelling down the street at him and the pounding of boots on stone that heralded nothing good. He _ran_ , still laughing breathlessly as he ducked and wove between evening pedestrians, _so sure_ — sure as _anything_ , sure as a squirrel leaping from ground to tree to branch, sure as a rooster crowing the arrival of the dawn — that nobody would be able to catch him. After all, he was a street rat, a guttersnipe, an urchin in his natural habitat, the dirty alleys and dumpsters of New York City were his home and he knew them better than _any_ cop or bull. Jack rounded a corner, waved cheerfully at Romeo and Specs with one hand as he spotted the other boys making their way down the street hand-in-hand (he wasn't going to question it, they were always like that _anyways_ ), and—

And something slammed into him from behind with the weight of a sledgehammer, he hit the ground chin-first and only barely avoided biting down hard on the tip of his tongue (that would have been pretty bad), and the last coherent thought in Jack's head before the cop behind him (well, at least now he knew why his friends had looked so _appalled_ when they saw him — sure, they could have been making fun of his doubtlessly silly face, but the cop made a hell of a lot more _sense_ ) hit him across the back of the skull and everything went black was of how _Charlie would probably be cold tonight without someone to bed-share with_.

( _He already knew he would be far colder, where he'd be going_ ).

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AHHHHH I finally got this chapter busted out!! It took me a little while to figure out how I wanted to structure it, but I think I've finally gotten it to a satisfying place. Let me know what you think!
> 
> (Also, we get more name-drops for random older!newsies — what can I say, this is seven years in the past and there's gotta be a bunch of older newsies that have long since left by the time canon rolls around — and a sneak cameo from some old? new? friends!)


	4. crutchie

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Illnesses are put in the past, Winter becomes Spring. Scars don't heal, but they do fade, and things are going to be okay.

_Early March, 1893_

 

* * *

 

Jack was late.

Normally, that sort of thing didn't worry Charlie. Jack had made a habit of returning to the Lodging House later than most of the boys ever since the storms started, something Specs had noted was relatively out of character (and he'd known the boy for close to _three years_ , so he would know). Still, he always returned with a bright smile and rosy cheeks, and never seemed bothered by the frequently-appearing cuts and scratches adorning his fingers as he chattered animatedly at Charlie about his customers that day and the sights he'd seen while on the streets. He loved describing colors and light, waxing poetic about a patch of early flowers he'd seen blooming or the way the noon sunlight had glinted off of a carriage-horse's flank _just so_ , and Charlie always found himself enthralled. There was just something about the way Jack's face lit up when he told his stories, the way his hands would wave and gesture to communicate shape and motion, that was — for lack of a better word — simply _wonderful_.

So normally, Charlie didn't worry when Jack was late. Whatever secret was keeping him out until nearly sundown, it made him happy and glow-y and didn't seem to do him any harm (besides his hands and fingers), so why should Charlie begrudge it? 

But tonight, it was past sundown, and Jack still hadn't appeared. He never stayed out after dark alone, _everyone knew_ you didn't go out alone after dark when you were a vulnerable child, and nearly all the other Manhattan newsies had already returned to the Lodging House. Eggs was snoozing away in the bed by the window, and he'd seen Bells (still wearing the nice-looking, if a little too-big, gray woolen coat she'd come back in a week and a half earlier) trotting down the hall with Bull and Minty and Pumpkin (apparently, this was short for Pumpkinhead, which told Charlie _more_ than enough about how the boy had earned his street name) easily twenty or thirty minutes ago, deep in conversation about one of the articles in that day's pape. 

Left alone to wait for his friend's return, Charlie swung his legs over the edge of the bed and sat there, thinking. Mostly about the last few weeks, and the drastic changes his life had undergone during them, and the new doors he found opening in his life.

The Manhattan newsies had all been nothing but kind to him in the time he'd been there. Many of the older boys seemed to enjoy helping him around the Lodging House, swinging him onto their backs or over their shoulders, while the youngers were always willing to offer him an arm or shoulder to lean on as he tried to walk for himself. Eggs always snuck him a little extra food in the mornings, and Robin (with their distinctive red shirt and brown vest) often stopped by in the afternoon to check on him and play a game or two of cards while they waited for the others to return. Everyone he'd met had welcomed him with a wide smile and bright eyes, and a few had even offered to cover a few days of rent if he wanted to get a bed of his own (he didn't — sharing with Jack was actually quite nice — but he appreciated the thought).

He still missed his family dreadfully — Lucy with her hair like autumn leaves and voice like a songbird's, the smell of his mother's cooking and the sound of her humming while she worked, the gentleness of his father's hands (rough from the day's work) and the boom of his laughter when he would lift Charlie into the air and spin him around until he felt like he was flying — but the hurt was slowly becoming dulled and softened by time. They were gone, and they wouldn't be returning, and that was — that was _awful_ , it was horrible and none of them had deserved it. But Charlie was still here, and _he wasn't alone_ (he'd been so scared, when it was just him and Lucy left and she couldn't speak anymore, that he would be alone forever), and that was—

That was okay. _He_ was okay.

Something downstairs slammed (the door, perhaps) and jolted him from his reverie. There was shouting — well, not _shouting_ , but a series of voices raised in panic and confusion and probably about five other things he couldn't pick out — and then the sound of feet nearly running up the stairs. The door to Charlie's room (well, _Jack's_ room, but he was sharing it so it was sort of his too) burst open, and the most distraught Specs he'd ever seen barreled in to collapse onto his bed, face pressed into the pillow to muffle what sounded like a scream of frustration dwindling into a series of curses. The level of emotion was unusual for Specs, who was one of the calmest newsies, so Charlie pulled himself upright and began awkwardly trying to hop across the room to his friend (he could call Specs his friend, just like he could call Jack his friend, that was _okay_ ) to ask what was wrong.

Well, metaphorically, unless his voice decided to make a miraculous comeback.

A soft hand found his elbow, and he glanced sideways to see Romeo as the other boy pulled Charlie's arm over his shoulder and helped him the rest of the way across the floor, wearing an uncharacteristically serious expression that seemed out of place on his round, normally cheerful face. By the time they reached the bed and sat down beside Specs, the older boy had pulled his head away from the pillow to rest it in his hands instead, breathing slowly and intentionally as though trying to calm himself. He managed to spare a weak smile for Charlie, reaching out to ruffle his hair in what had become a fairly commonplace gesture of affection. "Heya, kid. How's you doin'?"

Charlie shrugged, gesturing intently toward Specs in an attempt to ask — well, ask _what_ , ask _why_.

"S'nothing, I'se just— _fuck_." Specs grimaced, pressing his fingertips to his forehead and squeezing his eyes shut. "We's gonna have a bit of trouble, 's'all."

Beside him, Romeo piped up, "Jack got taken by one of the bulls. We's seen it, me'n Specs — big guy up an'— _wham!_ An' Jack went down, an' the bull clubbed him 'cross the head, an' then they took him away to th' Refuge, an' that's— that's _really_ not good, for sure."

"The Refuge? What's—"

Everyone paused for a moment, and Charlie wasn't sure who was more surprised — Specs, Romeo, or himself — at the sound (actual _sound_ ) that had just come out of his throat. It was whispery and rough, but it was his voice. _His voice_. And— Breaking himself out of his thoughts ( _and Jack wasn't there to hear it_ ), he cleared his throat and continued his question. "What's the Refuge?" 

As Romeo continued to fish-mouth (that is, _gape openly_ ) at the miraculous reappearance of Charlie's voice, Specs sighed heavily and explained, "The Refuge is— look, how'ta put it? It's a jail, of sorts, for kids an' orphans. Get tossed in there for loiterin', or stealin', or pickin' fights — they likes any excuse to take a fella in, since the Warden Snyder gets money offa it. I ain't been in — not like they ain't _tried_ , but I'se always real careful — but I'se _heard_ stuff 'bout it, an' nothing good. Jacky's — Jack's been in one, two times now. Last time he broke out, 'stead of gettin' released, so they's probably real mad at him 'bout that. Means things'll be _extra_ bad this time."

"Oh, that's when Jack found you'se!" Romeo grinned, finally breaking through his stunned silence to poke Charlie's shoulder playfully. 

Well, _that_ was news, but Charlie wasn't going to focus on it right now. Instead, he asked, "So, how long will he be gone?" The raspy tone of his voice (couple with the accent he hadn't quite lost from his mother's thick brogue) made him wince, but the others didn't seem to notice or mind it. Instead, he watched them exchange concerned glances.

Presently, Specs leaned back and took a few steadying breaths before responding. "See, we don't _know_. Last time was five days, but we ain't got no idea how long he was _s'posed_ to be in for, since he broke out. First time was— gimme a mo', been a while." He pursed his lips, deep in thought, and Charlie wondered how young Jack had been the first time he was put in the Refuge. Unbidden, he was struck with the image of a very young Jack in a small, dark room, looking out of a single window at the sky and reaching for it desperately (Jack did love the sky, he told Charlie about it nearly every day). "First time was 'bout seven months, I thinks."

_Oh._ Oh, that was—

That wasn't good _at all._ "Well, then, I s'pose I should start selling." Specs and Romeo both looked at him with incredulous expressions, and Charlie cleared his throat carefully before continuing, "Only, if Jack ain't gonna be around, I'll need to pay for the bed and food, won't I? And I can almost walk now—" 

" _Barely_ , you'se can _barely_ walk—"

"—well, I can do just _fine_ with something to lean on—"

"Right, like there's lotsa those on the streets."

"— _really_ , Romeo?" Charlie allowed himself to make a face at the other boy, who grinned cheekily in response. "I oughta do it for him, okay? Jack— Jack saved my _life_ , right? So I should at least save him his _bed_. I'll figure out something, some way to get around—"

" _Oh._ " Specs' eyes brightened with a flash, an expression of sharp realization crossing his features as he sat upright. A slow smile crept tentatively across his cheeks. "I think I'se got an idea. He might be mad, but— _yeah_ , I figures this'll be good. Hey, Charlie, you sleep early tonight, okay? We's gonna have an early mornin' tomorrow." He winked, for the first time that evening looking as though the world might not end overnight. "Romes, you make sure Charlie sleeps. I'se got a— _thing—_ to do."

"At night?" An look of alarm flickered across Romeo's face. "You'se not going _alone_ , is you?"

"Nah, I'll find someone. Fingers'll be up, maybe he'll go with me."

Demeanor changing with a flicker and a whirlwind, Specs bounced to his feet and bounded from the room, leaving Romeo and Charlie and still-sleeping Eggs alone in the dim light. After a few minutes of sitting together, exchanging brief conversation (Romeo seemed somewhat enthralled by the previously unknown wonder that was Charlie's voice, and in particular his faint accent) and wondering just what Specs had gone to do, they migrated across the room to Jack's bed so Charlie could lie down and rest. He hadn't thought things could change any more than they already _had_ , and yet here he was — Jack was missing, and Charlie would start selling papers tomorrow. Somehow.

A part of him found it ridiculous — he was _eight_ , even Lucy hadn't started working until she was fourteen, and he hadn't ever thought he'd even be able to walk, let alone stand on the streets all day for a living — but it almost felt good, the idea of doing _something_. Before his family had died (no point glossing over it), they'd always made sure to find ways he could help out around the house without the use of his legs, and the past weeks of begging and then recovering had felt almost stifling, in a strange way. He was excited to be useful once more, and if it could help Jack— well, that would be worth it.

Even so, it felt awfully strange to fall asleep alone, the usual warmth and energy of Jack's presence absent for the first time since Charlie had woken up and known he would live. He tried not to let himself be afraid, but in spite of that Charlie couldn't stop a few tears from trickling awkwardly down the bridge of his nose as he curled up on his side and promised himself that _things would be okay_.

He saw the results of Specs' idea immediately after he woke up. The older boy must have returned after he fell asleep, because when Charlie blinked awake and pushed himself into a sitting position as the Lodging House began to come alive, his eyes immediately landed on an object leaning against the side of his (well, Jack's — Jack's _and_ his) bed. It was rough, and wooden, and looked almost like an oddly-shaped cane at the first glance — but once he'd swung his legs over the edge of the mattress and reached out to grab it, Charlie realized just what he was holding: _a crutch_. A crude, old-fashioned one, with one arm rest and one hand-hold and enough knots and burls that it looked to have been carved straight from the tree. Despite the roughness of the work, the surface was impressively smooth, and whoever had made it appeared to have attempted to add some designs to the carving — there were rough swirls etched into the hand-hold, and what looked like small stars and suns carved shallowly onto the surface of the arm rest. When he looked closely, he could almost make out letters — a large 'C' was the most visible, and after a few more moments of squinting Charlie realized it was his name.

Someone — it couldn't have been Specs, there was no way this had been done all last night and the way he'd acted didn't seem to indicate that there had been any planning on his part until that point — had put a great deal of effort into making this crutch, _just for him_. One of the other newsies had to have done it — he hadn't been out of the Lodging House since he arrived, they were the only ones who would have known he _needed_ a crutch — but when he made his way downstairs (slowly, awkwardly, but he did it and did it _on his own_ ), everyone seemed rather surprised at the sight of it.

"Hey kid, nice crutch!"

"Well, lookit _you_ , walkin' all on your own!"

"Ooh, Charlie, you'se joinin' us today?"

" _Charlie_!" That was Romeo, scurrying over with an ear-to-ear grin threatening to split his face in two, Specs following behind with an expression of acute relief. "Wow, lookit that! How's it feel, huh? You'se good for the streets today, then? Oh, how's about you joins me an' Specs for sellin'! We's can give you lotsa tips an—" 

"Hold those horses, Romes." A casual arm slung itself over his shoulders, and Charlie caught a glimpse of red and brown beside him. "Charlie's gonna sell with me today — no point stickin' _three_ kids on a corner when two'll do, and I got an easier stakeout than you two anyhow." When he looked up, he caught sight of Robin's familiar grin and shaggy hair as they craned their head down a bit to look at him. "You'se alright with that, kiddo?"

He started to nod — Robin had been really nice to him, and he _did_ want to see the theaters they sold by — before remembering he could speak again. "Yeah, that sounds great!"

Robin blinked a few times in surprise, then laughed aloud and rubbed one hand through his hair roughly until there were strands falling all across his face and he had to blow them out of his vision. "Well, _whaddya know_ , your voice came back after all! You'se gonna teach me some of those folk songs of yours, then?" They winked, adding, "I know our little Cowboy said he's was gonna teach you to dance, but I'se can get you started — in return for those songs, of course. C'mon then, let's get some grub and hit the streets— days may be gettin' longer, but that don't mean we oughta waste 'em!"

With that, they lead the way out the door, and Charlie couldn't think of anything to do but follow.

Selling took a while to get used to. The first few days were spent mostly trailing after Robin (or whoever grabbed him first in the morning — an eight-year-old who looked closer to seven was an awfully precious commodity among the newsies, as he soon learned), slowly becoming accustomed to the aches and rhythms that came with using the crutch. His voice was similarly reluctant to return in full — it took some time for it to grow strong enough to reach the same levels the other newsies were using — but the combination of his age and his crutch (and, as Minty once said with a crooked smile, his 'cherubic' face — Charlie had _no idea_ what that meant, but it sounded a little funny) seemed to almost do the selling for him, and he often ran out of papes before the sun was even creeping towards the western horizon. After the transition period, he fell into a rhythm — get up, grab his crutch ( _his crutch_ , something that had been made for him as a _gift_ , wasn't that _amazing_ ) from where it always rested by his bed, stump downstairs for food, and grab hold of Robin's hand (or vest, whatever was easiest) before one of the other older newsies could snatch him up.

He liked working with Robin — they sold near the theatre district, and were friends with a lot of the performers in the area to boot, so occasionally they'd leave him to the selling in order to chat with someone or other about a new dance routine or get advice on a technique. He'd even overheard one of the theatre-owners telling Robin that once they were old enough, he'd be willing to personally sponsor them going to dance school for real, which Charlie thought was just fantastic. Robin always had a big smile while selling too, and introduced Charlie to all of their regulars, and — and Lucy was _gone_ , and Robin wasn't a girl (they weren't _anything in particular_ , the way they said it, and when Charlie looked at them he thought that sounded just fine), but selling with them felt almost like having his sister back.

It was nice.

Once or twice, Robin's (and his) customers would ask about Jack, reminding him bitterly that Jack was still missing ( _in the Refuge_ ). His friend had apparently sold with Robin before, and was quite popular with the customers, as they seemed genuinely concerned to hear he had been arrested once more. Somehow, it didn't surprise Charlie to know that Jack got on well in the theatre district — he had a sort of artistic _feel_ to him, in the way he described the world and the vibrance of both his smiles and his frowns (though Charlie hadn't seen many of those yet). Still, the recurring questions didn't do anything to assuage his worries for his friend. The weeks stretched into one month, then _two_ , then _three_ , and Jack didn't reappear.

Charlie adapted to the streets. His gait grew quicker every day, his voice carried louder and further through the air, he learned to smile guilelessly and fib up a better headline in the time it takes to snap his fingers. Soon, the customers knew him by sight even when he wasn't stuck to another newsie's side, and he'd found regulars all over the borough — a young woman who always offered him a fresh flower along with her pennies, a pair of teenage boys who ruffled his hair and held hands in back alleys after they bought their Sunday morning papes but before they went to church, a Chinese girl with a persistent cough who always walked her little sisters to school before crossing town to a textiles factory for work, and all other sorts who took to his brand of humor and his ever-present smile. He learned how to strike up conversations with anybody on the street (and _thank goodness_ Charlie had always been an outgoing child, he'd almost forgotten the days when he wished more than anything else for the ability to go outside and make friends), and it was almost inevitable that a nickname would follow.

"Oh, Crutchie, you are earl— oh, _I am so sorry_!" It was the flower-seller (Marina Castillo-Vega, who'd just told him last week with a delighted flush that she'd gotten engaged; he'd promised to save her a pape from the day of the wedding as a memento), in the midst of passing him a freshly-cut peony, and she seemed so flustered by her mix-up that she nearly dropped the flower. "I did not mean to, I simply— I _mean_ to say, Charlie, but I see your crutch and I—"

"Don't worry 'bout it, miss Marina! I'se not upset." He grinned as brightly as he could manage, offering up a paper in exchange for a few cents and the peony (a lovely pink one with layers of frilly petals that Jack would probably be absolutely _delighted_ by) and politely waving away the embarrassed flush that spread across her cheeks at the slip. "In fact, I kinda likes it. Sounds like a dead accurate name, innit? What with my havin' a crutch, an' all." Once upon a time, he might have thought he'd find it a little offensive, but now — with the crutch that was a gift made _just for him_ , the tool made to give him the gift of mobility and agency and _freedom_ — he can't think of anything better. "I think I'll keep it. You have a lovely day, miss Marina, an' tell your boy I says hello!"

She laughed brightly, one delicate hand covering her mouth but not remotely disguising the happy crinkling of her nose. "I will do that, Char— _Crutchie_. Please have a good day!"

And as he returned to his corner, crutch tapping on the stones of the street and another pape already in his hand (another call ready in his throat, another day of worries but those weren't going to get him down any longer because he was _here_ and he was _free_ and one day Jack would come home and they'd finally dance together like he'd promised), Charlie — _no_ , not Charlie, _Crutchie_ — knew he absolutely would.

* * *

 

_Jack didn't know how long he'd been trapped this time._

_Snyder's bulls hadn't taken kindly to him escaping so quickly the last time he was in, and they'd gone to the trouble of adding a sealed room to the basement. The walls were solid concrete on two sides, sheets of layered stone on the others, and the single window left inside had been sealed all around the edges with mortar. The window was cracked open, just barely, but it was far higher than Jack could climb to with the way the walls were now structured. No sound seemed to penetrate. The window must have been by a wall, because there was barely enough light to see by filtering in, even at what he assumed to be midday._

_He was in the room for days and days until he passed out, woke up dizzy and disoriented in one of the upstairs rooms, tried to run for the door, and was beaten soundly before being returned to the basement. Soap, rinse, and repeat. Eventually, Jack lost track of the number of times he'd gone through the cycle. They fed him only once or twice each cycle, which meant that half the times he passed out were due to pure hunger (the other half were when he felt the walls of the Room closing in on him and he panicked and panicked until he couldn't breathe and the world went dark)._

_Billy had been released during his first week in the room, so he didn't get to say goodbye, but every time he woke up upstairs Tux and Greenie were there to greet him. Sometimes, a girl with close-cropped hair and a narrow, angular face joined them, noiseless but always speaking quickly with her hands, a slingshot strapped to her waist. Slowly, the wake-ups began to run together, until he found it hard to remember what it was like to be outside._

_At some point, Tux got released in the middle of the night. Jack caught a glimpse of him through the window, the distinctive pale spots of his otherwise dark skin almost glowing in the moonlight, as the older boy was lead out the front door with a brusque shove. He walked down the street without looking back. The next morning, Greenie didn't ask where he'd gone._

_Then, Greenie fell ill. They moved him to another room — the end of the line, one of the bulls called it. Jack stopped running for the chance to see his friend at meals, but after a few days Greenie didn't come to those either. Jack raged and ran, and the next time he woke up upstairs, Greenie was gone. The girl with the narrow face who spoke with her hands couldn't even tell him where they'd buried his body. More boys were shoved into the rooms, more rats found their way into the walls and the mattresses and under the floorboards. Moths fluttered in the hallways, cockroaches crawled up the sides of the bed-frames._

_Time became meaningless. The world grew gray._

_The girl with the narrow face was released, and then Jack. They pushed him out the door with a shove that nearly sent him to his knees, laughing behind his back as the door swung closed. It was bright, far brighter than anything in the rooms or the Room, but it all seemed gray. It was morning, or mid-day, he couldn't tell. The streets around him seemed both too big and too small all at once, and he had to escape — had to escape — had to escape — and he ran._

_He ran._

_He walked._

_He dragged his feet step by step, because he didn't remember anymore how to find his way back to — not home, but the only place he had left — and by the time he recognized his surroundings, he only knew he'd gone the wrong way. The Lodging House was nowhere near the Bowery. Jack was lost. Maybe he'd always been lost. It was so hard to find his way when everything was the same dull, dead, goddamned gray—_

_"Crutchie, you got a story for me?"_

_"Well, I don't know, mister Faulkner, you got the pennies for one?"_

_Jack knew those voices. Or, perhaps, he'd known them once upon a time. He looked up._

_Garrick Faulkner was one of the regular theatre patrons. He was fond of Robin's dancing, liked to tell them to go join the ballet. They always said they'd think about it, but they might think more if he'd buy a pape. Once, he'd snuck them and Jack in to see a show with the rest of his family — his wife and their daughter had both taken to the charade with more glee than necessary. Miss Emily Faulkner was in secondary school now, but she always stopped by to give Robin hugs and exclaim about how tall Jack had gotten._

_Or, at least, she used to. Jack didn't know what she did now._

_Standing in front of Garrick was a newsie he didn't recognize. Short kid, with fluffy brown-gold hair and no cap (must be new), a big smile and a high voice. Something about him was familiar, or at least seemed to ring a bell in Jack's memory — the odd way he was standing? The tilt of his nose? What was it?_

_"Jack? Jack Kelly, if that isn't you!" Mr. Faulkner's voice boomed down the street, and Jack realized with a start that he'd been spotted. His feet carried him closer, even though the small bit of his mind that was still able to function wanted to run far, far away. Far away from loud voices and other people and hands and faces and voices— "We've been worried! Where have you been?"_

_He opened his mouth to speak, but only said silence. Were his hands shaking? Had Mr. Faulkner gone silver while he was gone, or was the world's grayness staining everything it touched? Staining him? He looked down to try and find color in his shirtsleeves, but they were stained with too much dirt to tell if any blue remained._

_It didn't matter, because the newsie with no cap turned to look at him with wide eyes and a smile like sunshine itself, and the world may have been gray but the boy — the boy with a wooden crutch and soft hair — glowed. "Jack! You'se okay!"_

_"Char— Charlie?"_

_The boy crossed the distance between them, bringing his glow and his sunshine and his color closer and closer until he and Jack were nearly nose-to-nose. His smile looked like a treasure. "It's Crutchie, now."_

_"Crutchie?"_

_"Yeah." Jack could count every red-gold freckle on his cheeks, could see reflections and refractions in his eyes. Crutchie's hair was brown-gold, his cheeks were rosy with health and happiness, he stood steady with the help of his crutch — the crutch, the crutch with all of those silly carvings and the unpolished wood but it wasn't gray it wasn't gray — and he reached up with one hand to wipe something off of Jack's cheek. A tear? Was Jack crying now? He hadn't realized, hadn't even noticed. Crutchie just smiled a little warmer and pulled him in for a tight embrace, close enough that Jack was enveloped by the sunshine and the color and neither of them could tell who was trembling worse (and neither of them cared)._

_Jack closed his eyes and breathed — in, out, in, out. Tears trickled down his face, but he didn't sob, or gasp — just breathed, in, out, in, out. He rested his head on Crutchie's shoulder, feeling his friend's (his friend's!) voice vibrate oh-so-gently beneath his cheek, like a cat's purr but one that spoke of safety and freedom._

_"Welcome home, Jack."_

_It was sunlight, it was color in a world that had been stained gray. It was_ beautiful _._

_"Thanks, Crutchie."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I!!! am!!! done!!! with this fic!!!! HUZZAH!!!!
> 
> thx to everyone who's read and commented on it!! <3 you guys mean the world to me. this may be my last fic for a little while (gotta re-adapt to that college life and all that), but i won't disappear! keep an eye out for more stuff in the future!
> 
> much love <3 <3

**Author's Note:**

> Yo! I'm writing this just because I need a quick creative break from 'jump or you're screwed', and because I really wanted to write this story!
> 
> So here's the story of how Crutchie joins the Manhattan newsies (as referenced briefly in 'tie a sheet to the bed')!
> 
> (Also, guys! I have a newsies/broadway sideblog that you should definitely check out! I mostly just reblog stuff, but sometimes I have headcanons or art, so ayyyyyy! I can also start posting writing there if folks want ;) once-that-train-makes.tumblr.com )


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